The Impact of Marketing Mix on Consumers’ buying behaviour

Abstract

In the current commercial world, every organization gives high priority to satisfy their

customer expectations. Satisfied customers will stay with organization for a long period of

time. Organizations give promises or create expectations through their marketing mix. If the

customers feel these expectations are experience reality, they will consistently buy the product

or they will be loyal to the brand. Jaffna peninsula is experiencing a brand competition never

heard in the past. Most of the organizations give better quality products with affordable price

and discounts, use attractive displays, and advertising modes. But we can observe one thing

that these all efforts were not designed to suit Jaffna consumers only.

There were two hypotheses set out for the study. H1 –The higher the positive opinion about

marketing mix leads to stronger the brand loyalty. H2 -The lower the positive opinion about

marketing mix leads to weaker the brand loyalty. Both of the hypotheses were tested two

different categories of four products (Toothpaste, milk powder, television, motor cycle).

Among these first hypothesis was confirmed for motorcycle, it revealed high positive

correlation (rp = 0.731) between marketing mix and brand loyalty. But even though there is

positive correlation between independent and dependent variable for other three product the

relationship is not strong positive.Further it was found that the word of mouth has high

influence than marketing mix.

An Introduction

The aim of today‟s marketing is to delight the target customers perfectly better than their

competitors. This goal ensures survival of the firms in the market arena. For this purpose

organizations adopt a different strategies and spend a significant amount of money for their

promotional activities as well as paying a handsome salary to their marketing personnel. On

the other hand organizations try to understand their buyers‟ behaviour. This field of studies

address how individuals, groups and organizations select, buy, use and dispose of goods,

services, ideas or experiences to satiety their needs and desires. Understanding consumers

behaviour and „knowing loyal consumers‟ are not simple tasks. Consumers may state their

needs but act otherwise. They may not be in touch with their deeper motivations. They may

respond to influence that change their mind at the last minute. Due to this increasingly,

decision makers have had to turn to summary statistics and to behavioural theory, and are

spending more money and effort today than ever before to try to understand why they buy?

How do they buy? The first two questions relate to relatively overt aspects of buyer

behaviour, and can be learned about through direct observation and interviewing. But

uncovering why people buy is an extremely difficult task. The answer will tend to vary with

the investigator‟s behavioural frame work of reference. This study tries to explain the

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influence of marketing mix on brand loyalty of Jaffna consumers. With opening of the A9

route, numbers of brands of various products are available in Jaffna and various promotion

strategies and modes are used to capture consumers. In the advertising side, Newspapers, T.V

channels, postal and radio are functioning in accelerated rates.

Statement of the problem

There are number of factors influencing the brand choice of consumers. According to

marketing literature, the brand rand choice is the function of 4 P‟s (ie. Product, place,

promotion and price) as well as buyers‟ characteristics. It is obliviously that most of the

promotional efforts of national companies‟ are not designed for Jaffna consumers as to

consider them as target market. Especially advertisements are not designed with the

consideration of cultural, social and psychological factors of the people who live in Jaffna

district and it is observed that there is a change in brand choice of high involvement product

(specially motor cycle). In the past, most of the Jaffna consumers were strong loyal to giant

Japanese brands. Now most of them switch over to Indian brands. (TVS, Hero Honda and

Bajaj). In this situations it is inevitable that to raise a question “To what extent Jaffna

consumers have positive attitude towards 4 Ps and also to what extent these 4 Ps lead to brand

choice and then to lead to brand loyalty. The following statement reflects the problem of this

study.

Do 4 Ps (Marketing mix) lead to brand choice and brand loyalty of Jaffna consumers?

Significance of the study

Organizations in all over the world spend a significant amount of money to create and

maintain brand loyalty among their target audience. Until 2002 the northern part of Sri Lanka

totally or partially separated from the other part of the country. Consumers choose and

consume what was available in the market. Now the situation is totally changed. Number of

brands in every product is available here. Due to this opportunity, the consumers have high

level of freedom in the selection process. On the other hand 4 Ps, especially advertisement

effort are high competitive among FMGs and some of durables. But there is no single study

conducted in Jaffna till 2003 to identify the impact of 4 Ps on brand choice. So this study will

help to identify influence of 4 Ps on brand selection and brand loyalty. Thus this research will

be useful the organizations to find out the level of brand loyalty and help to understand the

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black box of Jaffna consumers. Through this study organizations can identify the suitable

strategies and also redesign their promotional campaign to attract more consumers in future.

Objectives of the study

The specific objectives of the study are set out below.

1. To find out the influence of 4 Ps on brand choice of low involvement product.

2. To find out the influence of 4 Ps on brand choice of high involvement product.

3. To find out factors influencing buying behavior of consumers in Jaffna district.

4. To find out the level of brand loyalty among low involvement and high involvement

products.

Literature Review

Most of the studies support the existence of positive relationship between elements of

marketing mix and brand selection and brand loyalty. Bovee and quoted by Niranjan

Wejesekera, suggest that quantity sold will be depend on the number of dollars the company

spends on advertising that product (Niranjan Wejesekera, 1996 ). In another study conducted

on two Sri Lankan soap companies a positive correlation between advertising expenditure and

sales had been established in respect of the eight brands analyzed (Reffai, 1998)

Conceptualization

Conceptualization of this study explains the relationship between independent and dependent

variables. Consumers‟ positive opinion of marketing mix and brand choice and brand loyalty

has been accepted as positively related factors.

Conceptual framework

In the above model marketing mix was considered as independent variable and Brand loyalty

was dependent variable.

Hypotheses

1. The higher the positive opinion of marketing mix leads to stronger the brand loyalty.

2. The lower the positive opinion of marketing mix leads to weak brand loyalty.

Marketing Mix

Brand loyalty

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Data collection technique

Selection of research sample

For this study 600 respondents are selected from various occupation and places in Jaffna

district and two low involvement products (Tooth paste and milk power) and also two high

involvement product (motor bicycle and T.V) have been taken into analysis.

Questionnaire

Major part of the data was collected through questionnaire. This questionnaire has two parts.

Part I consists of 12 questions, which helps to get general information about consumer and

identify the degree of brands awareness. Part II consists of 20 questions to gather information

about marketing mix and brand loyalty. The questions have five options viz as strongly agree,

agree, uncertain, disagree and strongly disagree. The rating system was as follows.

i) For a positive question to measure a particular aspect.

Strongly agree 5

Agree 4

Uncertain 3

Disagree 2

Strongly disagree 1

ii) For a negative question to measure a particular aspect.

Strongly agree 5

Agree 4

Uncertain 3

Disagree 2

Strongly disagree 1

Data presentation and analysis

Description Classification Number of

respondent

Percentage

Age < 25 230 38

25 – 34 140 23

35 – 44 120 20

44 < 110 19

600 100

Sex Male 360 60

Female 240 40

600 100

5

Civil status Married 300 50

Unmarried 300 50

600 100

Area Town 320 53

Village 280 47

600 100

Occupation Private 110 18

Government 200 33

University 190 32

Students 100 17

600 100

Source: - Survey data

Age: - Sample of consumers is classified into four category. 38% of them are belong to under

25 years group 23% are under 25 – 34 age group, 20% of the respondents are 35 – 44 age

group, 19% are above 44 years.

Sex:- Out of 600 consumers 60% are male 40% of them are female.

Civil status: - Among total sample 50% of consumers are married the remaining is

unmarried.

Area: - The area has been classified into two types such as town and village. Based on this

classification 53% are in town area and 47% are in village.

Occupation: - 18% of total sample are working in private organizations, 33% are government

servants, 32% of them are university staff and the remaining 17% are students.

10% of milk powder consumers have a positive perception about marketing mix 90% of

others hold a weak opinion about marketing mix. On the other side 34% of toothpaste users

posses strong positive perception about 4 Ps 66% of the consumers have weak opinion about

marketing mix. Further 75% of milk powder consumers and 65% of toothpaste consumers

have high brand loyalty. In the case of high involvement products (Motor cycle), the majority

of respondents (60%) revealed strong positive opinion about marketing mix. At the same time

60% of motor bicycle holders are a low brand lower.

Correlation coefficient for high involvement and low involvement products.

High involvement

product

Low involvement

product

T.V Motor

cycle

Tooth

paste

Milk

powder

Marketing mix and brand loyalty 0.369 0.526 0.189 0.210

Source: - Survey data

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Low involvement products: The findings indicated a positive low correlation between

perception about marketing mix and brand loyalty of this category of products. In the case of

tooth paste correlation is very lower (0.189) than milk powder (0.210). At the same time, 75%

of milk powder consumers and 65% of toothpaste users are in high brand loyal group.

High involvement products: Both of the high involvement products have positive correlation

with marketing mix and brand loyalty. For T.V holder it was. 0.369 And for motorcycle

holders it was 0.526. This situation explains as marketing mix of motorcycle has a positive

relationship with brand loyalty.

Hypotheses testing

Hypothesis product High positive opinion of

marketing mix and brand

loyalty

Low positive opinion of

marketing and brand

loyalty

Tooth paste 0.219 0.417

Milk powder 0.312 0.492

Motor cycle 0.731 0.226

T.V 0.421 0.514

Source: Survey data

According to H1 there should be a strong positive relationship between independent and

dependent variables. So H1 is accepted for Motorcycles. The correlation coefficient value for

motorcycle (0.731) explains there is a high positive relationship between marketing mix and

brand loyalty. On the other hand the correlation value for T.V says as there is low positive

relationship between two variables. H2 is accepted to first three products in the table.

Other findings

i) Most of the respondents say that they buy a particular brand (specially tooth paste,

milk powder, T.V) not because of the influence of marketing mix of the organizations

due to the influence of the word of mouth (due to the opinion of their parents, friends

and other users)

ii) Indian brands are bought because of the availability of spare parts, lower price (in

comparing with Japanese brand) attractive advertisement.

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iii) 60% of sample use signal brand toothpaste and the same percentage of them consumes

Luxpray milk powder.

iv) 76% of respondent aware more than six brands in each product (awareness set) and

61% of them consideration set has two brands only.

v) Other than brand loyalty 20% of consumers change their toothpaste in time to time

because of the advice of dentists.

Conclusion

The research findings revealed a positive correlation between marketing mix and brand

loyalty, with the strength of this correlation being greater in respect of high involvement

products as opposed to low involvement products.

References: -

1. Phillip Kotler,(2003) Marketing Management, 11th edi. India: Pearson Education Inc

2. Richard MS Wilson and Colin Gilligan, (1999) Strategic Marketing Management,

New Delhi : Viva Books Private Ltd

3. Niranjan Wijesekara, “Advertising expenditure as determinant of a Brand‟s Share of

the market”, Sri Lankan Journal of Management (Vol. I Number 4, 1996)

4. Reffaim(1998) Sales Impact of advertising., A study of two Sri Lankan companies,

(MBA Research study PIM : University of Sri Jeyawardnapura,